In the sporting summary of the season that is ending, the ‘president’ Joan Laporta gave the first team a “fair approval” in a statement to Catalunya Ràdio. Beyond the lukewarm hopes generated by the signing of Xavi Hernández as coach, the second place in the league has ended up being the greatest achievement of the year: a simple consolation Faced with the disaster that was approaching and with a negative dynamic in recent months, it is due, in large part, to what Laporta describes as “an unconsolidated workforce.” A pious way of acknowledging that it has only been possible to patch up the nonsense resulting from years of mismanagement. Although it is also true that the club has within reach two prestigious triumphs at European level (the basketball Euroleague and the final of the Champions League for the triumphant women’s team), men’s football and the entire universe that moves around it is the engine social and economic of the entity. And it is precisely in this last section where Laporta has not yet straightened out with the diligence required by the unsustainable situation that he found on the table: a negative equity of 500 million euros, a high financial debt with immediate maturity and a salary mass of the staff of professional football that has not yet been able to be resized after the lethal legacy of the Bartomeu stage and that has only allowed signings based on circumstances interpreting the rules of financial fair play to the limit.
“The priority is to clean up the economy,” Laporta said. And recover a negotiating muscle that, today, is frankly weak in the transfer market. The two parameters are related. On the one hand, Barça is pending activation of too many “levers”, economic operations yet to be finalized that should reduce the accumulated debt and the lack of recent income to avoid, on June 30, a balance sheet with losses. We talk about close an agreement with CVC to sell part of the future television income and the sale of 49% of Barça Studios (with profitability and a business horizon yet to be discovered) and Barça Licensing & Merchandising (BLM), the club’s subsidiary company that manages the T-shirt business and other image rights. On the other, the club has not yet completed the refurbishment of template which must mean access to ‘fair play cash’ thanks to the reduction of exorbitant salaries that have come to be paid to players who, on the other hand, have not performed sportingly. Coutinho, the most expensive signing in history, has already been sold to Aston Villa (for 20 million), Dembélé is further away than close to the Camp Nou and the possibility of transferring Frenkie de Jong to United is being considered to generate a profit margin and liquidate the outstanding amortization and salary.
Fifteen months after his appointment, Laporta has assumed the maximum responsibility of the entity not only as institutional representation but also as first executive director. After the resignation of Ferran Reverter as CEO, the figure of the president has adopted a more personal profile. He has assumed the responsibility of immediate manager and will also have to answer for his work. The sponsorship of spotify (t-shirts and rights to the name of the Camp Nou for four years for some 280 million) and the announced reactivation of the project for the Barca Space with a daring financial operation with Goldman Sachs are to his credit. But the impossibility of obtaining liquidity and resources will be in its debt if the “levers” are not activated properly. And even if they do, they will leave the club dangerously mortgaged and with no room for error.